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Saturday March 20th 2010

We were very excited a few months ago to discover that Ultra Culture had been accredited on Rotten Tomatoes, the world’s most comprehensive movie reviews aggregator, and one of the few American movie sites that catered equally well for a UK audience. Until now.

This weekend we found out that our reviews, and those of most other British reviewers, will no longer contribute to the Tomatometer as Flixster (who bought RT back in January) have decided to shut down their UK operations and run the British site remotely from the States. In practical terms, you can expect to see a significant decrease in the number of British, world cinema or art-house releases that get any attention on Rotten Tomatoes.

It’s a sad day for people who don’t want to watch The Bounty Hunter this weekend.

UPDATE: Here’s a response from Flixster.

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I read your “exclusive” report about Rotten Tomatoes shutting down in the UK, and I wanted to let you know that it’s simply not correct.

Flixster is absolutely committed to continuing the localised international versions of Rotten Tomatoes, both in the UK and Australia, which have been enormously successful and popular with cinemagoers.

Rotten Tomatoes will continue featuring localized content for each market, as well as the best (and worst) reviews from critics the UK as it has for many years.

The addition of Flixster adds a new audience and creates an online movies leader in both markets. We want to continue the momentum that our fantastic local teams have created.

At the same time, we’re centralizing editorial content in Hollywood, to bring fans closer to where the movie action is, and we’ll be bringing more of Rotten Tomatoes’ acclaimed content to users of both Rotten Tomatoes and Flixster.